Tissue and Hygiene

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Tissue and Hygiene in Malaysia

Sep 2014|Pages: 66

Price: US$2,400

About this Report

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Making changes to packaging becomes popular within retail tissue in 2013

Many tissue manufacturers innovated with regard to packaging in 2013 to attract more consumers, and one of the trends within designs is using characters from toys. Designs based on toys included Hello Kitty, Angry Birds, Mini Zoo and Winnie-the-Pooh. This trend came from well-known cartoons and recent popular games on smartphones. Such tissue packaging is able to attract consumers’ attention, especially children, rather than the normal printed scenery on tissue and hygiene products. Products that adopted toy designs included Kleenex, Premier and Tesco private label.

Consumers become value-conscious regarding household products

Consumers are very price-conscious, especially those on low and medium incomes, because of the high costs of living that is forcing parents to work hard and spend carefully in terms of everyday products. This trend was particularly noticeable when the rate of inflation rose, fuel prices increased and when the consumer price index went higher in 2013. As a result, consumers were careful with their spending, particularly with regard to non-essential products.

Private label growth is slow in comparison to that of branded tissue and hygiene products

The intensified competition within tissue and hygiene resulted in private label only growing slowly as consumers remained confident about using branded tissue and hygiene products instead. Private label tissue and hygiene products are always perceived as cheaper goods of a lower quality. In addition, major international players, such as SCA Hygiene (M) Sdn Bhd, Kimberly-Clark (M) Sdn Bhd, Kao M Sdn Bhd and Unicharm (M) Sdn Bhd, together dominated tissue and hygiene in 2013. These large players are able to offer prices that consumers can afford, as well as frequent discounts. Private label products from stores such as Tesco and Giant are locally available to many consumers in cities within Malaysia, which has encouraged sales, and consumers can easily compare the prices of these products with other brands. There are many low and medium-income consumers that like to shop at Tesco stores due to the free parking spaces available and the low-price offers.

A switch in strategy from domestic companies

Domestic companies, such as Takaso Rubber Products, have tried to change their distribution strategies from modern distribution channels to independent small grocery stores and small convenience stores. This was to make their products more locally available to consumers. On the other hand, many domestic manufacturers, such as Tips Industries Sdn Bhd and Halex Woolton (M) Sdn Bhd, were highly focused on export markets since local sales were saturated due to the number of existing players. The export markets that they were particularly focused on were those in emerging countries, such as Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Myanmar and Indonesia.

The overall forecast is positive

Over the forecast period, growth of hygiene-related products is set to be faster than that of tissue-related goods in value terms; however, overall tissue and hygiene is expected to record low value growth due to economy uncertainty. Tissue-related goods are not considered as essential compared to food and beverage products. Rising awareness and education about hygiene have resulted in consumers purchasing more hygiene-related products, which is expected to continue over the forecast period. Product innovation will result in the differentiation of new goods from existing ones and is expected to appeal to consumers. It is also expected that consumers will continue to be price-conscious over the forecast period due to economic uncertainties.